Since
Donnie Yen’s Ip Man 1 and 2, wing chun became much more popular in the west.
Wing chun is known to be practical, not beautiful. And never before were they
able to put this martial art on the big screen looking so good. In Ip Man 1 we
learned of Ip Man in Foshan, how he stood up to the Japanese and why he escaped
to Hong Kong . In the sequel we learn how his
life was in Hong Kong was up to the moment he
started teaching Bruce Lee. A third film was made called “The Legend is Born:
Ip Man” starring Yu-Hang To as Ip Man. This film is actually a prequel to Ip
Man 1 and 2. In November 2013 the DVD of “Ip Man: The Final Fight” was released
and despite the fact that I wasn’t really looking forward for this film, I
decided to watch it anyway. And I have to admin, I wasn’t totally disappointed.
Anthony
Wong (may know him from “Legend of the Fist: The Return of Chen Zhen” or
“Internal Affairs”) plays Ip Man during his life in Hong
Kong . And while the setting is similar to Ip Man 2, The Final
Fight focuses more on philosophy than action. A great deal of time is put into
the lives of his students, his chronic stomach problem, the death of his wife
and his relation with Jenny a.k.a. the Northern lady and Master Ng Mui. So you won’t see Ip Man
as a bad-ass fighting machine but as a person that deals with a life that he’s
not used to. You also see him fighting alongside his students more than just
him finishing of loads of people. Anthony Wong is much more believable than
Donnie Yen in my opinion. Anthony is an older actor with much more experience
and brings everything very natural. There are fight scenes of coarse, and while
they differ from Donnie’s they’re still exhilarating. You can see that
Anthony’s fighting is less ‘clean’ but it fits with the older character.
Overall I
think that Ip Man: The Final Fight was definitely worth my time. Don’t expect
another film from Donnie and this movie will surprise you more than you think.
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